Artificial intelligence is changing recruitment, learning, and career development at remarkable speed. It can screen candidates, identify skills, personalise learning, and automate processes that once consumed hours of HR time. However, as AI becomes more deeply embedded in the workplace, perhaps the more important question is not what it can do, but what we should still insist on doing ourselves.
This was one of the central themes to emerge at the ITNewsAfrica.com Future HR Summit 2026, held at Gallagher Convention Centre, Johannesburg, on 29 July.
During the panel, “Future-Ready Talent: How Technology Is Redefining Recruitment, Learning and Career Growth”, I joined Nina Sternberg, Azaqiqe Mkosana, Nadia Leita, and Kudzai Kanyangarara to explore what AI means for the way organisations find, develop, and retain talent.
Dereck Sigamoney
Faster hiring doesn’t necessarily mean better hiring
AI presents an extraordinary opportunity in recruitment. It can process large volumes of information, identify patterns, match skills to roles, and potentially uncover talented candidates who may have been overlooked by more traditional recruitment methods… but technology cannot compensate for a fundamentally poor process. Recruitment processes are already sometimes inadequate or circumvented. Automating those processes could simply allow organisations to arrive at the wrong outcome more efficiently.
There is also another side to the equation: candidates themselves have access to AI. CVs and applications can be tailored to perform well against automated screening systems, making it increasingly important to understand the human being behind the application. This is where human judgement remains critical.
Skills matter... So does the person behind them
One of the most interesting opportunities AI presents is the ability to look beyond traditional markers such as qualifications, job titles, and years of experience and identify underlying skills and potential. The panel explored how this could open doors for people from less traditional career and educational backgrounds.
This question was posed during the discussion: would you rather hire someone with ten years’ experience, or someone with the right attitude and the ability to acquire the skills they need remarkably quickly?
The answer will depend on the role. Experience remains enormously valuable, particularly because of the judgement and softer skills acquired over time. But in fast-changing fields such as technology, the ability to learn, adapt, and use new tools effectively is becoming increasingly important.
Where algorithms can still come unstuck is culture fit
An individual may be an exceptional technical match for a position and still not thrive within the organisation. Good people often leave businesses not because they cannot do the job, but because they simply do not fit the culture.
Emotional intelligence, values, resilience, interpersonal dynamics, and how someone responds under pressure remain difficult to reduce to data points.
AI should enhance learning, not replace it
The same principle applies to learning and development. AI creates an opportunity to move away from one-size-fits-all training towards development based on actual skills gaps and individual needs. However, there is a difference between using AI to accelerate learning and using it to avoid learning altogether.
If technology continually supplies the answer, people risk losing the ability to interrogate information, solve problems, and think critically for themselves. The goal should therefore be to use AI as an addition to the skills we already have; not as a substitute for developing them. The panel identified critical thinking, problem-solving, adaptability, and emotional intelligence as increasingly important as technology takes over more routine work.
Capability doesn’t remove accountability
AI’s ability to outperform humans in certain tasks will inevitably raise difficult questions about when we should hand over control. I referenced an example involving Boeing during the panel, where AI technology reportedly outperformed a human-controlled aircraft when responding to simulated in-flight emergencies. It is a fascinating illustration of AI’s potential, but it also raises a very human question: even if technology can perform a task better, are we always comfortable allowing it to do so – and how do we opt out if we aren’t comfortable?
Then, when an AI-supported decision goes wrong, who takes responsibility?
For organisations, accountability cannot simply be transferred to an algorithm. Leaders need policies, governance frameworks, human oversight, and clearly defined responsibility for how AI is used. Without them, adoption risks becoming what I described during the discussion as a “runaway train”.
People still need to come first
The future of HR is unlikely to be a choice between people and technology. It will be about finding the right relationship between them. Organisations should absolutely invest in AI. They should use it to remove unnecessary administration, uncover insights, personalise development, and help people perform at a higher level.
It is essential to remember that technological capability means very little without capable people applying judgement, challenging outputs, and taking responsibility for the decisions that follow.
My closing thought at the Summit was therefore a simple one: “HR leaders will succeed if they invest as much in their employees as they are investing in AI tools.”
That may ultimately prove to be the most important AI investment an organisation makes.
